A month-and-a-half ago the International HIV/AIDS Alliance in Ukraine teamed up with the Gromashevskiy Institute of Infectious Diseases in Kyiv to provide a new form of treatment for four patients suffering from hepatitis C.
One of them was Oleksiy Dmytrushkivsky, a soldier and
former spokesman for the Ukrainian military. He discovered he had been infected
with hepatitis C after earlier being diagnosed with diabetes.
The initial tests showed the level of the virus in his
blood was very small, which indicated that he had been infected only recently.
That meant he had come into contact with the virus while serving at the front in
the east of Ukraine.
“Honestly, I was very upset. I had a very severe form
of hepatitis and diabetes, plus deep depression,” he said.
Before managing to get treatment at the Gromashevskiy
Institute, he had tried to find alternative methods of treatment. The
combination of illnesses he faced meant conventional treatment was risky.
“I had diabetes, so it was impossible to treat
hepatitis.” One of the (common) side effects of the treatment of hepatitis
is type II diabetes. In my case, it is cancer of the pancreas.”
Now cured of hepatitis C, Dmytrushkivsky recalls the
poor conditions on the front he experienced from the early days of Ukraine’s
military campaign to regain control of its eastern regions from Russian-backed
militants – conditions that probably led to him being infected with the
life-threatening virus.
Dmytrushkivsky worked as a military spokesman and
journalist from April 2014. At the start, from April 22 until mid-May that
year, and already sick due to his diabetes, he had to do his job with no proper
equipment, or even access to a vehicle.
“There were no proper communications, there was no
Internet. Can you imagine such situation: At 11 pm, a call comes from Kyiv: ‘We
need a photo from Luhansk as soon as possible.’ And then I realize that Luhansk
is 250 kilometers away, and I have no transport,” Dmytrushkivsky told the Kyiv
Post.
At times he was working in an army camp in a tent set
up over a dugout in the center of a field. In winter temperatures dropped to -24
Celsius outside, and it wasn’t much warmer in the tent, where it was -20
Celsius. Water for 700 people was trucked in three times a day.
“Because of illnesses and the poor conditions I could only
work actively until just before lunch. After lunch it started – the weakness,
the drowsiness,” he said.
Dmytrushkivsky said the situation with the spread of
the Hepatitis C virus in Ukraine had worsened because of the military conflict
in Ukraine. Soldiers giving each other first aid is a common form of
transmission, as they often have scratches and open wounds on their hands.
Another problem is simply a lack of awareness.
“People don’t know anything about Hepatitis. I, for example, never saw the soldiers in
the war zone wearing gloves when administering first aid. In combat conditions,
in the trenches, there is no hygiene. My friends were at Luhansk airport. What
kind of hygiene can you talk about when there’s no water at a place?” Dmytrushkivsky said.
Today the situation has improved, but only slightly,
due to volunteer organizations buying medical equipment and supplies for
soldiers at the front.
Unable to continue serving for health reasons,
Dmytrushkivsky is now trying to help in the war effort in other ways.
“I’m the kind of person who just can’t sit still. I
decided to create an organization to work on the restoration of the Donbas,” he
said.
Dmytrushkivsky is currently conducting a pilot project
together with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Kyiv Patriarchate. The project
involves providing counseling to soldiers returning from the war zone who have
problems readapting to civilian life.
“In my opinion, a problem that is not solved by
psychologists or society could be solved by (a member of) the clergy,” he said.
That’s not the only project Dmytrushkivsky is involved
in – at the end of August he plans to visit a children’s home in Slavyansk to
deliver stationary, backpacks and other school supplies. He started collecting
money after hearing from the management of the home that there were shortages
of school supplies for the children.
“I’m really attached to these kids. I’ll go there and
I will take them to school (myself),” Dmytrushkivsky said.
Kyiv Post staff writer
Faina Nakonechnaya can be reached at [email protected]
